Wednesday, January 31, 2018

Voting for the Inlander's annual Best Of issue is now open — a poll that allows our readers to name their picks for the finest food, art, culture and shopping in the area. You can vote here, or look for a paper ballot in the Feb. 1 issue currently on newsstands.

Is there a particular Spokane restaurant you consider a buried treasure? Think your favorite local band deserves some recognition? Wanna give a shout-out to the best play you saw last year? Now's your chance to make your opinion known.

You have through Feb. 14 to participate, and the 2018 winners will be announced in our March 22 issue. For a taste of what folks chose last year, you can see 2017's results here.

Chef Steve Leonard, recruited to helm the renovated and rebranded Steam Plant Kitchen + Brewery, has left his post a week after the restaurant's reopening.

This week's issue of the Inlander, on the street and online Thursday, includes a feature on the new look, name and menu for the Steam Plant Kitchen + Brewery, which reopened to the public last Monday following a seven-month, $4 million renovation to the historic downtown space owned by Avista.

To oversee the remodeled and rebranded kitchen, which serves "upscale casual" fare — sandwiches, stone-oven pizza, classic entrees, shareable small plates and more — the Steam Plant recruited chef Steve Leonard, who previously served as executive chef for restaurants at Chicago's Wrigley Field.

This week, however, word is that chef Leonard has departed the Steam Plant to return to Chicago, and thus the Steam Plant is seeking a new chef to take the helm.

In response to our inquiries into Leonard's departure, Steam Plant Kitchen + Brewery General Manager John Lockhart says via email that restaurant management cannot provide any details on the nature of Leonard's departure, but that they "wish him well on his future endeavors."

According to an OFM report released Jan. 31, "Estimates from 2010-13 show that prior to the start of ACA coverage provisions in 2014, Washington’s uninsured rate hovered at about 14 percent. For the next three years, the uninsured rate continually dropped to 8.2 percent in 2014, 5.8 percent in 2015 and 5.4 percent in 2016. The uninsured rate in each of the three years resulted in a new record low in Washington."

In the first three years of the Affordable Care Act, Washington's uninsured rate dropped at a faster pace than the rest of the country, according to a study released today by the Washington State Office of Financial Management.

In 2013, about 14 percent of Washingtonians were uninsured, a rate that had remained pretty steady since at least 2010. That was largely in line with the national rates, which sat a little closer to 14.5 percent.

But once the act took effect, with an individual mandate requiring insurance and penalizing those who don't have it, the rates quickly dropped, down to 8.2 percent in 2014, and then to 5.4 percent in 2016, which was expected to be about the same in 2017, according to the state's three-year study. Meanwhile, the national rate dropped to about 8.6 percent uninsured in the same time.

Pissed
A bill sponsored by Spokane Valley Sen. Mike Padden seeks to give judges more leeway to order drug and alcohol testing for people accused of DUIs and minor crimes. But some attorneys say the bill is unconstitutional.

IN OTHER NEWS

Kerry Arnold isn't dead
Despite what you may have heard, Kerry Arnold is still alive. The 41-year-old man was shot last October in a car jacking. Days later, police found his car, and shot and killed the man in the driver's seat.

Yesterday, Spokane County Prosecutor Larry Haskell announced that the two Spokane police officers who shot and killed the suspected vehicle thief, Chad Cochell, would not face criminal charges.

Haskell also erroneously reported that Arnold, the victim, was dead, which is not true. Kerry Arnold is alive. Haskell apologized when he realized the error. (Spokesman-Review)

Fact checking the president
President Trump delivered his first State of the Union address last night. True to form, the president's statements weren't completely truthful.

The tax bill passed in December was not the biggest cut ever, as Trump claimed; nor does the green card lottery randomly hand out green cards "without any regard for skill, merit or the safety of our people," as he said during the address. (PolitiFact)